As makers of automobiles find new ways to reduce costs in the manufacturing thereof, globalization has been incorporated into the mindset. By globalizing or communizing the platforms upon which vehicles are made, costs in design and inventory are greatly reduced. Therefore, original equipment manufacturers of vehicles are striving to maximize the savings in the design, development and manufacture of vehicles by making as many of the parts of a vehicle common throughout the world.
One problem associated with globalization is that it is quite possible that a vehicle will be transported and used in a region of the world that has laws that are different than those of other regions. And while the use of certain technologies is perfectly acceptable in one geographic region, the use of that technology in another geographic region may violate the laws or regulations of that region. In one such example, a telematics unit of a vehicle has the capability of identifying its geographic location with a great deal of certainty. The geographic location is at times transmitted to a call center to facilitate the driver of the vehicle in any one of a number of ways. In certain regions of the world, it is, however, illegal to transmit the geographic location of a vehicle to a call center outside of the county in which the vehicle is being operated. Therefore, there is a need to design a telematics unit that is capable of identifying and determining whether geographic location information is allowed to be transmitted to a call center or whether that information must be inhibited from being transmitted to a call center.